


Bleed Out

by orphan_account



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Angst, Blackrom, Caliginous Relationship, F/M, Mind Control
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-12-26
Updated: 2010-12-26
Packaged: 2017-10-14 03:38:41
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 898
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/144924
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Vriska dies a painful, if temporary, death, and somehow still manages to get exactly what she wants. (Spoilers for Rise Up, Thief and onwards)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bleed Out

This place is so beautiful. Golden light everywhere. After six sweeps of a life nocturnal, it's almost unbearable. What is it going to be like to die? Will there be a moment of blankness, like sleeping, before she wakes up as a goddess?

At the moment, she thinks anything would be better than this. Because the pain - ah, _fuck_ , the pain - is unbearable. Blood is slick between her fingers, dark and sticky as berry juice, staining the delicate grey of her skin with blots and trails of inky blue. If she wasn't in agony it might be quite beautiful. To distract herself from the pain, she tries to count how many bones might be broken. Aradia fucking _destroyed_ her. Just as planned, she thinks, and smiles painfully.

"V-Vriska?" says Tavros. She can only imagine what her smile looks like - a crescent of bloodstained teeth, like she's ripped out her own throat - and the faltering look on his face is adorably horrified.

She can't say anything - she thinks she might have bitten through her tongue - but she takes control of Tavros' mind with an ease that strikes her as almost offensive. He still doesn't even want to fight her. So frustrating. She makes Tavros dip his fingers in the blood pooling in the hollow of her neck, feeling his fingertips brush against her skin with the faintest of shivers. He never touches her if he can avoid it, and now his thoughts are a mess, longing and fascination coiled up in horror and anxiety. If she had more time she would have liked to untease that particular emotional birds-nest at her leisure.

 _Kill me,_ she says. Keep calm, Vriska. If you freak out he'll freak out too and then you'll be fucking bleeding out for _hours_ and _fuck_ it hurts so much just _kill me_ you coward just _do it_ after all I've done for you you can't do a little thing like putting me out of my misery?

All these voices in her head. She could do without that. She tries to take refuge in her dreams, but even there the pain creeps up on her, a lake of blue blood dragging her down. Terezi looks on helplessly, and Vriska is briefly delighted to see the other girl lose control. She couldn't have planned this any better. Goddamn, this is better than blinding her. But she can't stay here for long. She needs to concentrate on Tavros.

She makes him write and write until his hands are raw from the rock, and drops of orange-brown blood mingles with her own. She hears her breath grow more and more ragged, and she thinks Tavros might be trying not to cry. She wants to scream, and before she can stop herself the scream burns through Tavros' mind like a forest fire and he is scrawling insanity across the rock. His little whimpers of pain would be sort of fascinating if she wasn't trying not to pass out.

He's not going to do it, she realises. Worse, he's going to leave her.

 _Tavros,_ she wails, ashamed because it sounds awfully like she's begging.

"What?" he says, and he's definitely crying now. Little bastard. How does he think _she_ feels?

 _Stay, please_ \- her train of thought is cut off by a new surge of excruciating pain. This has to end soon, doesn't it?

"Why would you want me to stay?" he mumbles. He tries to wipe the blood and tears from his face, but it just renders him even grubbier, blue and brown smudged across his cheeks. There is something raw and true here, she thinks, this is Tavros without any of his happy little distractions. She licks blood from her lips, tasting its metallic sting on the tip of her tongue, and remembers kissing him. What a shame he can't muster up the courage unless the alternative is stabbing her with a lance. Coward.

 _Maybe I don't wanna die alone,_ she thinks at him. It's not true, she reassures herself. She's always been good at dealing with being alone, hasn't she? But it'll put another knot into Tavros' contorted little universe of self-hatred.

"So _make_ me stay!" he says, "I know you can do it." He's sobbing openly now, brownish tears trickling down his cheeks and dropping on her like sepia rain. One lands on her open mouth, but the salt is indistinguishable from the blood. Drinking his tears. What a ridiculous thing.

 _I thought we were friends, Tavros_ , she says. Might as well twist the knife. _You'll kiss a girl but you won't even stay with her while she's dying? I did all this for you, Tavros. Don't you like me at all? Aren't you grateful?_

"...no," he says, "And... I'm not sorry. I, I think you deserve this."

 _Yes_ , she says, _I bet you do_. She tries to grin, the corner of her mouth twisting. It ends up as a grimace of pain, but she feels like the point has been made.

"I hate you," he says quietly, sniffling, "I hate you _so much_." He hauls himself to his feet, stumbling as though Aradia had beaten the shit out of him too. "I hope, um, I hope you die _slowly_."

"I hate you too," she says aloud, the words harsh and broken in her throat. But he's earned it. She watches him leave. _I'm so proud of you, Taaaaaaaavros._


End file.
